It was over by the end of the first quarter. Twenty-three rounds and a nail-biting preliminary final... and our hearts were broken by the end of the first quarter. | OPINION by Osman Faruqi
It was over by the end of the first quarter. Twenty-three rounds and a nail-biting preliminary final, all leading up to thousands of Sydneysiders making the migration to Melbourne for the grand final and our hearts were broken by the end of the first quarter.
The Swans team that turned up at the MCG on Saturday looked nothing like the team that had stared down Collingwood the week before, the team that had clawed its way into the finals. Of course there’s never ever anything wrong with losing — someone has to do it — but losing like this?Justin McManus The afternoon started as well as it could. A crisp and sunny spring day, a joyous and convivial atmosphere as 100,000 fans poured into the stadium. And even though us Swans were clearly outnumbered, in the stands the bright red and white stood out, and if you were in a Sydney-dominated section you could almost convince yourself we had the numbers.It was hard to muster up the energy to cheer “Syyyyyydney” when the on-field action was so grim.
Early on it was tempting for some to blame the umpires but this result had nothing to do with the umpires. It was all about the competition’s best team destroying the second best, a team that could have and should have played much better.. But watching your team make mistakes they had avoided all year, watching a beloved forward line fail to deliver, watching the grins on Geelong fans get wider and wider … it was hard to not be disappointed with the performance.
Even those of us with realistic expectations of Sydney’s performance were hoping for something more like the 2016 clash against the Bulldogs, rather than the 2014 annihilation we faced at the hands of Hawthorn. In the end this was even worse. It’s hard to be angry at a team that played so beautifully all year, and finished as runners-up — but it’s easy to be disappointed when you know how good Sydney is, and how far from their best they performed.
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